Copyright

India’s Intellectual Property Ecosystem: A Record-Breaking Year Insights From The Annual Report 2024–25 Published By The Patent Office

Insights from the Annual Report 2024–25 published by the Patent Office

Summary: India’s intellectual property ecosystem achieved a record-breaking year in FY 2024-25, with total filings surging nearly 20% across patents, trademarks, designs, GIs, and copyrights. This growth signals rising confidence in domestic innovation and the effectiveness of modernisation initiatives like digitisation and AI integration. For readers, the report highlights India’s evolving IP landscape, offering insights into opportunities, challenges, and the country’s strengthening global position in intellectual property protection.Continue Reading India’s Intellectual Property Ecosystem: A Record-Breaking Year Insights From The Annual Report 2024–25 Published By The Patent Office

The digital age has revolutionized news consumption and public discourse, with online platforms becoming hubs for critiquing current events and sharing diverse perspectives, often by using short excerpts (“clips”) from existing news broadcasts and other copyrighted material. This practice, while fostering a dynamic information ecosystem, lies at the intersection of copyright protection and freedom of expression. A recent dispute between a major news agency and online commentators has brought India’s “fair dealing” doctrine to the forefront, questioning its application in the digital realm. This article examines fair dealing under Indian copyright law, focusing on short clips in news reporting and online commentary, supported by judicial precedents, and offers suggestions for navigating copyright issues.Continue Reading Fair Dealing in the Digital Age: Navigating Copyright for News and Online Content in India

Decoding Patent Infringement: Essential Elements, Equivalents, and Estoppel in Crystal Crop Protection v. Safex Chemicals

The Delhi High Court’s decision in Crystal Crop Protection Limited v. Safex Chemicals India Limited & Ors.[1] offers insights into determining patent infringement, focusing on the essentiality of claimed elements, the application of the Doctrine of Equivalents, and the implications of Prosecution History Estoppel. The judgment highlights the importance of claim construction, and the binding nature of representations made during patent prosecution.Continue Reading Decoding Patent Infringement: Essential Elements, Equivalents, and Estoppel in Crystal Crop Protection v. Safex Chemicals

Weather “CROMPTON PEBBLE” and “PEBBLE” are similar or identical?

Crompton Greaves Consumer Electricals Limited’s (Crompton) appeal has been dismissed, upholding the order that restrains Crompton from manufacturing, selling, offering for sale, advertising, directly or indirectly dealing in electric irons under the impugned “PEBBLE” trademark, due to V Guard Industries Limited’s (V Guard) application.Continue Reading Whether “CROMPTON PEBBLE” and “PEBBLE” are similar or identical?

Reject patent application on merit, not for failing to follow procedure: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court, on February 24, 2025, passed an order in Arcturus Therapeutics v. Controller of Patents[1], remanding the case back to the patent office for reconsideration by the Assistant Controller of Patents on merit.Continue Reading Reject patent application on merit, not for failing to follow procedure: Delhi High Court

         

  

Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) can generate and manipulate our ideas and thinking by creating human-like content via non-human intelligence.[1] These software(s) such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT/ GPT-4, Google’s BARD, inter alia, are initially trained on a large data sets and computing power. After the training, they are capable of self-enhancement to generate unique and personalised content.[2] This has posed novel questions before the copyright experts, as content generation, previously reliant on human inputs, has moved beyond that realm. Now, instead of answers based on user queries – as obtained via Google’s search engine – customized personal content is delivered to the user. Creation of this new content through GenAI has led to concerns on copyright infringement, privacy violation, libel and defamation, etc. Copyright infringement is particularly worrisome as the companies are using the user-generated data to train these software(s), which includes the data generated by minors, amplifying their vulnerability. Questions arise regarding the extent to which the companies can claim ‘fair-use’ exception of the Copyright Act? This article attempts to bring some clarity over these issues. It incorporates two landmark US cases against OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Alphabet Inc., respectively[3], and their implications in India, including the India’s recently-passed Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023.Continue Reading Guardians of Genius: Securing Tomorrow’s Generative AI via Copyright Protection